Was Eyes Wide Shut a commercial and critical Flop?!

I remember being disappointed when I went to see it as it was billed as a Tom Cruise AND Nicole Kidman vehicle when the truth of the matter is that she was barely in it. The story focused almost entirely on him.

Also, that one piano note that kept getting hit gave me a migraine.

I watched it again on Netflix streaming about a year ago and I enjoyed it a lot more as I knew what I was in for.

They should of showed Tom’s dong

[quote]should of

Oh dear!

I went to see this when it first came out with friends.

To this day I still don't know what to make of it.

It's either brilliant and I just don't get it, or it's crap.

My friends think it's crap. I'm not so sure.

R4 It's Crap.

This mess took a YEAR to film.

I also saw it opening weekend and was so disappointed. I'd heard that Thomas Gibson was in it and I so wanted to see him naked. This movie was advertised like it was high art pornography or something, so I was expecting graphic nudity!

R6 It took Two years.

Kubrik died like in the middle of it.

It is neither brilliant nor a piece of crap. It is an intensely weird, watchable film that highlighted what the elites get up to, made by someone very much in the know. There is a reason that he moved to England and stayed put, refusing to fly or tread on US soil ever again. It was filmed on a very closed set. Nobody had seen anything that bizarre before, and never will again. And then, to the surprise of no one, Kubrick died immediately after its release.

I saw it when it came out and the aftermath of the audience was mostly "What WAS that? Who DOES that?" You have to watch it a few times to absorb it. Sure, Kubrick was a bit of a dirty old man, but there is a clear reason he saw this film through to its end. It deserves to be discussed more.

[quote]There is a reason that he moved to England and stayed put, refusing to fly or tread on US soil ever again.

How do you mean?

It’s brilliant

I'm still convinced the whole abomination was ultimately about Kubrick trying to "out" Cruise.

The movie American Pie came out at the same time and it was all the rage while the Cruise movie wasn't.

It was bad. I remember leaving the theatre and the workers giving everyone a free pass to another movie whenever we came back again.

Kubrick is overrated. There, I said it. This movie was a mess.

It's a horrible movie and it was clear to the studio at the time that it was going to be a disaster - b/c of all of the "rumors" that they were actually having sex on film. As one memorable review noted (paraphrasing) "don't be fooled by the hype - whether the sex is real or not, it's still a lousy movie."

I remember Kubrick having to recruit a sex consultant on the set because the chemistry between Cruise and Kidman was nonexistent. Remember that these two were a real life couple at the time. Tee hee!

I saw it the weekend it opened, and I was disappointed. "We all wear masks" might have been an interesting theme in 1975. Not by 1999.

I remember it being boring.

It was released the weekend JFK Jr. died.

I remember JFK Jr. vanished the day the movie opened.

Sad that JFK Jr. never got to see it.

R11, I literally mean that he refused to step on an airplane (a phobia thing that I somewhat share) but permanently relocated to England and never came back to the US. All of the New York scenes in that film were done in England. He used sets and tried recreating, but for a guy born and bred in NYC, he wanted nothing to do with the USA or living in the USA. One can theorize as much as they want for this, but I suspect it was because he probably knew a few things that did not sit well with him.

I could get into his using "2001" technology to forge the moon landing footage, this perhaps being a reason for him to flee the US, but I will be called Boris by the imaginative folks on this site, so I'm going to stop there. The movie is good. It needs to be watched a few times. Tom Cruise took a serious career risk by doing that part and I commend him for it.

Or maybe he just got increasingly crazy and obsessive as his health declined and he got old, r23.

Maybe he was just an Anglophile.

Like all Kubrick films EWS contains many symbols and hidden meanings. There are several interesting Youtube videos that attempt to dissect the film. Watching EWS and notice: the Christmas trees, rainbows (including seemingly unintentional light flares from the camera lens), star symbolism and many others. I loved the movie when it came out, my friend hated it. I loved the music and bought the soundtrack. If you didn't like the movie the first time try watching it again with Eyes Wide (and ears) OPEN.

It was crap, but I still enjoy rewatching.

The paintings by Kubrick’s wife, Christiane, that decorated the Harford apartment captivated me. I loved them so much that I own one now.

Kubrick’s version of New York was pathetic.

[quote] This movie was advertised like it was high art pornography

It was implied you would get to see Tom and Nicole actually having sex.

Hidden meanings are fine, but how about a plot?

Also, Tom didn't even show his ass. I fell asleep watching it online. Wouldn't be caught paying to see it in a theater.

All I remember from this is a scene where Cruise is kissing Kidman in front of a mirror. They were married, but had no sexual chemistry at all.

R30 what are you implying? That the marriage was a sham?

"Eyes Glazed Over" was one critics review, I remember. It was pretty dull. All this silly nonsense with masks, orgies etc. Big deal!

Once the word got out that there was no Cruise/Kidman sex, everyone who went was interested in the masked orgy, which was also disappointing due to those digitized figures that covered up anything you'd be interested in seeing.

The one thing that I remember, and as a gay man I'm surprised this stuck with me, is the absolutely stunning nude women Kubrick seems to populate his films (that have naked women) with. I haven't seen a ton of nude women but his definitely stand out

I snuck in to see it, I was like 12. Wasn't there a scene where Nicole Kidman took a piss and wiped her vag? I remember being very terrified of that.

[quote]Kubrik died like in the middle of it.

No, just his career.

[quote]I literally mean that he refused to step on an airplane (a phobia thing that I somewhat share) but permanently relocated to England and never came back to the US. All of the New York scenes in that film were done in England. He used sets and tried recreating, but for a guy born and bred in NYC, he wanted nothing to do with the USA or living in the USA.

He also shot "Full Metal Jacket" in the jungles of England.

"'Eyes Wide Shut' turns out to be the dirtiest movie of 1958." - Stephen Hunter, The Washington Post.

I think the biggest disappointment of the film was not seeing Cruise stripped, strapped to a lazy susan and spun around like Kevin Williams in the wealthy elite orgy.

I remember enjoying it and going back to see it again and enjoying it just as much. I like Kubrick a lot but find Clockwork Orange unwatchable.

Kubrick, this is the story I read, was a licensed pilot and flew his own plane. He heard once while flying over the NY metro area air traffic controllers who didn't know what the hell they were doing and it scared the shit out of him. He never got on a plane again. After he moved to England he came to America again by boat for the world premiere of 2001 in DC and then went to NY for the opening at the Capitol. After he returned maybe he never came back. When he found out ACO was opening at the Cinema 1(I think or else it was the Coronet) in NY he remembered going to the theater and them not properly or not at all masking films so he called them up from England to make sure the masking of the film was what he wanted.

Kubrik sounds like a nutjob!

Interesting thread on Stanley Kubrick and Tom Cruise during ‘Eyes Wide Shut’

Thx R39 reading that thread later today.

After reading the suggested related DL thread, I suggest you guys google image "Gary Goba". Yummy!

I liked EWS, but it took a few times to fully like it. I love most of his work but Full Metal Jacket is my least favourite. His work definitely declined as he aged. Would have loved to see his version of AI over Spielhack’s.

At the time, yes, but you have to remember it was marketed as a "sex movie" but it's really nothing of the sort. And also, almost all of Kubrick's films have received better reviews years after their initial release. Just look at Barry Lyndon.

[quote]I liked EWS, but it took a few times to fully like it.

You shouldn't have to see a movie a few times to end up liking it.

[quote] the absolutely stunning nude women Kubrick seems to populate his films

Most impressively Virginia Wetherell in Clockwork Orange.

I watched it in the theatre my last year of high school with a girl who I think thought it was a date. Needless to say I came out soon after and she married a man but we both left thinking WTF. I know have seen it two times later and think it’s hilarious as a cult film.

Bret Easton Ellis thinks it is a brilliant classic

freek perv Kubrick (! read the bios) was suckin on Nicole and tom both. he died from too many poppers. ev body know that.

Yea, scietoloogy makes its own poppers, Sci Pop,,,,theyr way strong and they have the stamp of approval of kirsi alleys asshole. and cunty.

r2 it's more of a ding

I hated this turd of a movie. And I loved Barry Lyndon.

this movie is creepy as fuck. really bad vibes.

The nude women were horrific. All skins and bones and boobs. Skinny shanks. They were model not the playboy types who look better naked.

I remember thinking how anyone can get excited about an orgy. Been there. Done lots.

Hi Boris/r23!

"I remember thinking how anyone can get excited about an orgy. Been there. Done lots."

Do tell. I've only seen orgies in movies. They all looked terribly unerotic.

We call them sex parties. Try one if you live in a city. Live a little.

A brilliant movie, especially if you don't mind the absence of car chases, explosions, and everything explained for you.

I remember seeing it in a multiplex in 1999 with my former bf and... this movie wasn't for the multiplex cinema. It's not a popcorn film. It's weird. it's long. But it is engrossing and kind of hypnotic.

It also has what I think may possibly be Nicole Kidman's best performance.

The scene where she discusses almost running off with that hot fucker and leaving wussy Tammy was incredible. When she's not in the movie, it suffers.

Lovvved this film for its cinematography!

Kubrick borrowed from Nabokov's "Ada" (Book 2 Chapter 4) for the films secretive orgy, all the way to the monotonous piano chord throughout it.

I saw the film twice and don't remember the orgy. Maybe because I find orgies boring to be in. And kind of silly. I top out so to speak at a threesome.

R57 which sums up Tom's current filmography.

I never understood the appeal of groups sex or having more than one partner. I'm very much a one-on-one person and would be too distracted with someone else around. I prefer to focus on one partner at a time. Pleasure him while he pleasures me!

[quote] It is an intensely weird, watchable film that highlighted what the elites get up to, made by someone very much in the know.

What it describes is what happens in a fin-de-siècle Viennese work of fiction by Arthur Schnitzler called "Traumnovelle."

Kubrick did not make the story up out of thin air.

it's crap

The ballroom scene where tipsy Nicole is dancing with the silver daddy, who wants to eff her: she's constantly glancing over the daddy's shoulder, daring Tammy to watch her allow herself to be seduced.

Excellent!

Both Tom & Nicole talked about how they devoted 2 years of their lives with endless rehearsals to fulfill Kubrick’s vision and yet they gave two of the most boring and wooden performances in cinema history. It certainly was not worth their sacrifice.

R44 That's like saying you don't have to listen to a piece of music several times to like it.

Happens all the time.

This movie is so fascinating... more than any other Kubrick film, with perhaps the exception of 2001. I could watch it 1000 times and still find new things. It's a masterpiece and the absolute perfect enigmatic coda to an incomparable career.

Also, Nicole's pot monologue is incredible... "If you only knew!"

There is an unrated version that was released a year or so ago but I haven't seen it. Don't know what it includes.

It's Eyes Wide Shut week all week on "Entertainment Tonight!"

R69 - I have this two-disc set. This is the unedited version. Purchased nearly 8 years (?) ago. No longer available.

It made $162 million on a budget of $65 million. The critical reception was divided.

Only movie I’ve ever seen where everyone congregated outside the theater afterwards and spent 15 minutes talking to complete strangers about “what the fuck did we all just watch.”

It felt like a shaggy dog story to me. An amazing journey to nowhere.

Oh and I remember my mother saying, when they divorced a few years later, that it was because “they made that sick movie and let that evil into their lives.”

[quote]All of the New York scenes in that film were done in England.

Long time ago a friend used to rent a one bedroom on E11th St. that had a bathtub in the kitchen. I don't remember the connection, which means how it happened, but I do know that the set design crew replicated my friend's apartment for some of the scenes in the film.

[quote]Kubrik died like in the middle of it.

He died before they finished the edit. In his case, the editing could go on for well over a year, so while he didn't die in the middle of it, there is no way to know how much more he would have done on the film.

The EV apartment recreated for the film.

Tom looks manic in OP’s clip,

R78 I guess he wasn't doing much acting in that scene then lol

Nicole giggling and wheeling around when she was “high” was painfully bad acting.

I return to this movie repeatedly. Part if it is the atmosphere. It’s warm and filled with Christmas lights, very beautiful. The backwards chanting music during the secret ceremony is bizarre and compelling. It’s not my favorite Kubrick, but even Kubrick’s worst has merit. I think he was a genius.

One of his lesser works. That's all.

It really does grow on you. When I first saw this film I thought it was boring and didn’t give two shits about Tom or Nicole.

Now after repeated viewings I think it’s a masterpiece, worship Nicole, and would kill for Tom if he asked me to.

I used to rent an apartment in Yorkville exactly like this one pictured. It's the rear left unit and the tub was right next to the sink. My stove was in that exact spot with that same window at an angle. A classic ancient tenement layout.

It's boring to people who don't care who Jeffrey Epstein is, and who Sydney Pollack was smuggling nuclear triggers for.

Sydney Pollack was cast as the lead bad guy in this movie, and that wasn't an accident.

Sydney Pollack, gunrunner

Philip Weiss on November 26, 2013

Everyone’s talking about the Israeli TV broadcast in which Arnon Milchan, a Hollywood producer, says that he spied for Israel in the U.S. and brought out nuclear triggers and such. (Back in the days when the U.S. was worried about a society that didn’t get along with its neighbors in the Middle East going nuclear). The BBC:

Mr Milchan, 68, said he was recruited to Israel’s Bureau of Scientific Relations, a secretive organisation founded to supply the nation’s nuclear programme, in the 1960s by Mr Peres.

Then the owner of a successful fertiliser company, Mr Milchan said he aided the bureau in obtaining scientific and technical information for confidential defence programmes.

At one point, Uvda alleges, Mr Milchan was operating 30 companies in 17 countries on behalf of Israel.

But I’m shocked by what Milchan says about the late Sydney Pollack, actor and director (of Out of Africa, They Shoot Horses, Don’t They? Tootsie, Jeremiah Johnson, Michael Clayton, The Day of the Condor, Absence of Malice).

During the interview, which aired on Monday, Mr Milchan also said Academy Award-winning director Sydney Pollack helped in covert acquisitions of sensitive military equipment.

More from Haaretz:

Another revelation is that director Sydney Pollack, who died in 2008, was Milchan’s business partner in many of his activities. The director of “Tootsie” and “Out of Africa,” Milchan said, “was my partner in aerospace manufacturing and airplanes, all kinds of things.” When asked if Pollack knew of and participated in all of Milchan’s activities, Milchan said: “He had to decide what he was willing to do and what he was not willing to do. On a lot of things he said no. On a lot of other things he said yes.”

Pollack was born in the U.S. His Jewish identity? From the LA Times, on Pollack’s death in 2008 at 73.

The son of a pharmacist, Pollack was born July 1, 1934, in Lafayette, Ind., and moved with his family to South Bend.

“I think of it with great sadness,” he said of his experiences in South Bend in a 1993 interview with the New York Times. “It was a real cultural desert. There weren’t many Jews like us, and it was real anti-Semitic.”

From the Times obit:

He increasingly sounded wistful notes about the disappearance of the Hollywood he knew in his prime. “The middle ground is now gone,” Mr. Pollack said in a discussion with Shimon Peres in the fall 1998 issue of New Perspectives Quarterly.

So was Peres his connection? Here’s the Peres interview, a pdf. Very cineaste. In the Israeli broadcast, Robert DeNiro says he knew of Milchan’s activities, and understood. He was fighting for his country… I wonder how many folks in Hollywood knew of the allegations regarding Pollack? And approved.

What's interesting is that same Philip Weiss who wrote the article above, he was hand-picked by Jeffrey Epstein to write a big NY Mag puff piece about Epstein, titled, "The Fantasist".

This is how the deep state operates, the people we think are the bravest truth seekers are just controlled opposition, working for the deep state/international bankers.

In Weiss' Jeffrey Epstein puff piece, Weiss downplays the significance of the whole child-sex-trafficking aspect, and he spins it all as Epstein just being kinky/into fantasies.

Kubrick died 2 days after showing the studio his director's cut of Eyes Wide Shut.

All we saw was the Final Cut, edited by the studio.

In the missing 20-something minutes, the child sex trafficking aspect of the Frankist/Kabbalah/Globalist elite is addressed. This is what got Kubrick killed.

Kubrick was literally telling us about Jeffrey Epstein and the Frankist/Kabbalah cabal that runs the international banks and the Western media.

Strange Temple on Jeffery Epstein's Orgy Island

Remember that Jeffrey Epstein's partner/Mossad handler was Ghislaine Maxwell, the daughter of media mogul Mossad tycoon Robert Maxwell:

Jeffrey Epstein is by far the biggest Donald Trump scandal, but the media and most liberals refuse to even mention it, while they go on and on about Russia.

Eyes Wide Shut indeed.

Robert Maxwell, Promis, & Sabbatean Frankism Exposed

Rabbi Marvin Antelman On The Sabbatean Frankist Illuminati Connection

The Frankists use ritual orgies as part of their Jewish Kabbalah/Satanic religious rituals.

By having a bunch of men inseminate one girl, they hope to give birth to the anti-Christ/Jewish Messiah.

Rosemary's Baby was also all about Frankist/Jewish/Kabbalah/Witchcraft/Satanism.

Rosemary's Baby novel was written by a Frankist, and Polanski was a Frankist, and the movie was produced by Robert Evans, yet another Frankist, who was close friends with Henry Kissinger, another Frankist.

Oh, and Eyes Wide Shut was based on a novella written by an early Frankist Jew in Vienna, Austria, from the same Frankist cabal that gave rise to Sigmund Freud, who taught the world that everybody wants to have sex with their mother, a Frankist agenda.

"Frankism was a Jewish religious movement of the 18th and 19th centuries,[1] centered on the leadership of the Jewish Messiah claimant Jacob Frank, who lived from 1726 to 1791. Frank rejected religious norms, and said his followers were obligated to transgress as many moral boundaries as possible. At its height it claimed perhaps 500,000 followers, primarily Jews living in Poland and other parts of Eastern Europe."

It's the celebration of all that is evil, and the destruction of all that is good and orderly. That's why the gay community is used so effectively by the Frankists, because too many gays just want to watch the world burn to get back at their parents:

" In his classic essay "Redemption Through Sin," Scholem argued a different position, seeing Frankism as a later and more radical outgrowth of Sabbateanism.[11] In contrast, Jay Michaelson argues that Frankism was "an original theology that was innovative, if sinister" and was in many respects a departure from the earlier formulations of Sabbateanism. In traditional Sabbatean doctrine, Zevi – and often his followers – claimed to be able to liberate the sparks of holiness hidden within what seemed to be evil. According to Michaelson, Frank's theology asserted that the attempt to liberate the sparks of holiness was the problem, not the solution. Rather, Frank claimed that the "mixing" between holy and unholy was virtuous.[6] Netanel Lederberg claims that Frank had a Gnostic philosophy wherein there was a "true God" whose existence was hidden by a "false God." This "true God" could allegedly only be revealed through a total destruction of the social and religious structures created by the "false God," thus leading to a thorough antinomianism. "

Louis Brandeis & Jacob Frank, Frankists Today

Louis Brandeis was a descendant of one of the prominent Shabbatean/Frankist families of Prague. They did not follow Frank’s example of conversion to Islam or Catholicism, but maintained a Jewish identity, though very detached from Jewish ritual and practice. His mother Frederika Dembitz Goldmark Brandeis “disdained formal religious ceremonies and encouraged her children to value ethical teachings of religion, including Judaism, while eschewing the age-old rituals.” Brandeis grew up in the family environment, where, though born a Jew, he was not raised as a Jew. In fact, he celebrated Christmas, but not the Jewish holidays; neither did he keep the kosher laws, or the sabbath. He was very disengaged from Jewish practice. Brandeis’s maternal uncle, Gottlieb Wehle, wrote an ethical will in which he exhorts members of his family to “respect their ancestors’ tradition of antinomian disdain for the normative Judaism of traditional rabbis.” This was perhaps a reaction to the family’s waning allegiance to the Frank sect.

r94 it was all based on Frankist Kabbalah. The location of the orgy scene was even a real Rothschild mansion.

The early Rothschilds in Germany were some of the first Frankists, and they took it into England, France, USA. In fact, Louis Brandeis' Frankist grandfather came to the US with an agent of the Rothschilds.

17 Genuinely Creepy Photos From A 1972 Rothschild Dinner Party

Mayer Amshel Rothschild paid this guy big money to infiltrate and take control of the Free Masonry lodges of Europe and the US.

Johann Adam Weishaupt 6 February 1748 – 18 November 1830) was a German philosopher, professor, and founder of the Order of the Illuminati, a secret society.

The Frankists also started a Jews-only Masonic Lodge, called B'Nai B'Rith (Blood of the Chosen). B'Nai B'Rith is the organization that created the Anti-Defamation League.

The ADL was appointed in charge of censoring non-kosher social media discussion by Facebook, Twitter, and Google/Youtube.

One can easily find articles discussing and explaining the symbolism and imagery of both "EWS" and of Kubrick, known for his exquisite attention to detail.

This movie, "2001: A Space Odyssey," and "The Shining" comprise Kubrick's trilogy of revelation about the powerful, secretive, and depraved men who control governments and people.

Frankists founded these movements:

Reform and Conservative Judaism

Marxism/Communism

Freudian psycho-analysis

Frankfurt School cultural Marxism

"Spartacus' was no "Ben Hur.

It's the only movie I have been to where the audience started booing when the credits came on at the end.

R84 through R98 - Jesus take the wheel!

Tammy looks like she just smelled cookies!

The only believable part was 2/3 of the way through the movie in a scene where it's late at night and Tom is walking on the street and a small group of toughs slam him against a car and call him 'faggot'.

Why it almost could have been taken out of any day of his life.

'I liked it!'

Lina Lamont

Interesting trivia on a forgettable and terrible film: Steve Martin was Kubrick's first choice for the lead role that Tom Cruise ended up playing.

The films commercial worldwide earnings where a little disappointing. Its budget was $65 million. Worldwide gross at least $162,901,208. Given films have to make roughly three times their budget to break even, EWS just missed that mark.

But home video sales, TV screenings, streaming etc would have pulled it well into a nice tidy profit.

It was clear that Tammy has never fucked a fish.

This Frankist conspiracy guy seems like a loon.

So let me get this straight (pun intended)...on DL, every man, and I mean every goddamn man in this world is gay and waiting to take it in the ass, but a brilliant filmmaker who got killed after his last project didn't use his art form to subtly convey truths about what is actually going on.

Alright. Got it. Yer right! Now wait as I spread the cheeks and take it. Because getting fucked in the ass? That is truth. The only truth.

What's all this about a franks conspiracy ? Children eating hotdogs is none of your concern. Leave the kids alone that's what I say !

Kubrick wanted to make a star out of Leelee Sobieski.

By the way, WHET to her?

Helen Hunt, Leelee Sobieski, and Jennifer Lawrence should star in a movie about a mother and her two daughters.

[quote] Given films have to make roughly three times their budget to break even,

3x? Why is that? Isn't the budget is the budget?

Mainly advertising costs and theater owners taking their cut, r113.

I think it's interesting that Arthur Laurents claimed he made more money than either Streisand or Redford on TWWW. His agent who was Leonard Bernstein's sister based his percentage not on a percentage of the profits or gross but on the earnings of the producer. Clever, but why didn't the stars' agents know to do this? And exactly how would they know the producer's earnings with all the creative bookkeeping that goes on in Hollywood?

Thanks r114

Kubrick's suspicious and perfectly convenient heart attack meant that not only did he lose control of the final cut of the movie, but he lost control over how the movie was marketed.

So the studio, which was contractually forced to release the movie, was able to market it as a titillating sex movie, knowing full well that this would kill the movie at the box office and in the press. All by design.

Remember that 20th Century Fox was legally obligated to release the movie "Idiocracy", but they didn't want to because the movie joked about Starbucks selling hand jobs, and it depicted Costco and other big brands in a negative light.

So 20th Century Fox released the film at like 2-3 theaters, for one week or one weekend, just to meet it's bare minimum contract obligation to release the film.

The same sort of thing was done to EWS, but even more so, because Kubrick was dead and the movie could be re-edited to be incoherent.

This film was going to be Kubrick's masterpiece, some 10 years in the making, with a huge Jeffrey Epstein-style pedophilia narrative completely stripped from the final cut.

R117 if you mean the Leelee section, it makes sense that was stripped out as it made no sense and didn't fit in the film even as a vignette.

Not from a pizzagate perspective, but we all know there is a pedo network of wealthy connected people and those that procure for them. I know personally of someone who was able to skirt the law several times while getting teaching jobs until some pedo crusaders outed him everywhere he went. But he was able to skate for a long time due to who he knew. And of course there's Saville for a very famous example of the same type of thing.

If Kubrick was interested in exposing this it makes sense TPTB would do what they could to silence it

r118 EXACTLY, glad you get it. I heard a rumor/theory that in Kubrick's director's cut of EWS, Tom Cruise and Nichole Kidman were forced to give their daughter to the Victor Zeigler cult as initiation or to save their own lives.

Oh, and LeeLee and her father are suspected of being shown behind masks at the orgy in the movie that was released.

So there appears to have been a whole Jeffrey Epstein/pedophilia narrative to the movie that was cut.

Oh, and in the final scene of the released movie, there is a toy in the toy store called "The Magic Circle".

The Magic Circle is a magicians club in England where elite pedophiles like Lord Janner, Jimmy Saville, and Prince Charles were members.

And The Magic Circle has a Young Magicians program, where those old pedophiles can "teach magic" to innocent little kids.

I think JK Rowling plays a role in all of this. Her Harry Potter series made magic wildly popular with kids, and basically serves as a stepping stone for occultism in children. And note that JK Rowling is basically a Twitter mouthpiece for the globalist elite these days. I think she and her books were lifted on angel wings by elite occult pedophiles.

You shouldn’t have to work this hard as an audience member to get meaning from a film. It’s pretentious tripe. And I’ve watched it three times at three different points of my life.

Didn't Nicole get undressed and go pee on camera?

r120 without Eyes Wide Shut, the only mainstream look into that very real occult Jeffrey Epstein kind of world would have been Rosemary's Baby.

I'm very glad Kubrick made Eyes Wide Shut, and I've greatly enjoyed putting the puzzle together.

Another fascinating view of a Kubrick movie is how The Shining is quite possibly a Kubrick confession about his involvement in the faking of the NASA Moon Landings.

R119 I haven't seen it recently, but in the background of the final scene in the toy store don't you see Tom and Nic's daughter walking away and turning the corner out of sight with two well-dressed men? All the while T&N are blabbing away and off she goes. If you're not looking for it you wouldn't notice it since you're focused on T&N. Maybe that's the best he could do, since it's a far from obvious background activity in the scene

Oh, God, don't tell me the falt earth people are going to start cropping up.

R125 scoff if you must, but what we're discussing is probably the most interesting thing about the film

r125 huge difference between moon landing hoax and flat Earth. Why do you think we haven't left lower orbit since the early 70s? NASA claims we no longer have the technology to leave lower Earth orbit. NASA claims the technology to do so, and had the technology to live broadcast a landing on the moon on the first try, but now we can't even leave lower orbit.

r124 I'll look for that, I have the movie. I'll look for a still image of the masked orgy attendees that are rumored to be LeeLee and her father.

R128 now that you mention it it makes sense they could have been there. After all, that's where Tom got his costume and that mask that fits in perfectly with the Fidelio group.

The scene made no sense in the movie; it never would have occurred to me they were connected

[quote]Why do you think we haven't left lower orbit since the early 70s?

we also seem to have lost the plans for that cool dune buggy that fit inside the lunar module somehow. And some of the moon rocks turned out to be petrified wood. WTF?

But the worst is: all the original footage is gone. Lost for all eternity. And the reason is that videotape was expensive, so they had to tape over it. ???? The most stupendous scientific achievement ever and there couldn't be a bake sale or something to raise cash to pay for new videotapes so the footage wouldn't be gone forever?

And R125 I apologize I misunderstood your post

r129 maybe this is them at :54 second mark. Note the young female mask with the purple hair, and the taller male next to her:

Make that 52-53 second mark

The moon landing deniers are talking like that stuff they're listing is fact.

is that a male couple dancing starting at about 10 seconds in? I don't remember that from the original, is this from the director's cut?

R135, yes it is and it was always there. I think there are a few more same-sexers in the extended scene but none doing the dirty

IMO, much of the problem is Cruise. He's not your regular heterosexual man and it really showed in this one. Little douchbag' entire act finally became total transparent. No, I don't think he's gay but he's not within norms either. IMO, he's something of a neuter, asexual. Cruise failed at conveying the character's standard heterosexuality.

r134 thinks we haven't gone back to the moon since the 1970s because NASA doesn't want to have a space station on the moon.

But your suppositions are just that.

r139 It is fact that we haven't been to the moon for at least 47 years, if ever.

It's still conjecture on your part as to why.

R137 you are exactly right. Every man in the movie is specifically defined: Pollack is a man's man, Nightingale is living on the night Fringe of society, LeeLee's father is a perv, the hot daddy at the party who hits on Nic is a lothario, and of course the gorgeous virile soldier. Cruise is like a cipher, a nin-defined lump

Now I'm watching clips on YouTube

Nichole's father was a psychologist, and a relatively elite satanic pedophile:

Because it was the most sexually provocative film of 1955.

[quote]the background of the final scene in the toy store don't you see Tom and Nic's daughter walking away and turning the corner out of sight with two well-dressed men?

You make it sound like she was being abducted. The two men were engaged in conversation, ignoring the kid and everyone else, and she walked behind them as they wandered away. Nothing to suggest anything nefarious (or interesting) IMO.

Every move is planned in a film.

A kid wandering off behind some other people doesn't happen like that in movies.

There were probably multiple takes perfecting everything within the frame.

R146 The 2 men were very similar to the 2 men sitting at a table at Ziegler's party. The scene is when Tom Cruise's character is summoned to Ziegler's washroom. At the base of the Jacob's Ladder-like stairway is a table with 2 couples, the men in those couples are balding and look like the 2 men a the toy store. See the 17 min mark in the linked video.

Why would a director of Stanley's stature use two minus-talents like Tammy and Nicole?

R149 Tammy was the biggest star and box office magnet at the time.

But Stanley was an artist and Tammy is a ..................homosexual?

Paul T. Anderson is an artist and Tammy appeared in Magnolia the same year and was equally terrible.

R10 you sound like a classic idiot.

R152 PT Anderson did what Kubrick did, he had Tom Cruise play someone who is essentially himself. PT must have been intrigued by certain things because he went on to make The Master.

What could have been a great thread ruined by a conspiracy moron.

The whole movie is about a secret society, r155.

R155 This happens with threads, they go off in other directions. EWS was considered a commercial and critical flop at the time of its release. Like many other Kubrick films, over time people change position on the film and it has a second life and becomes a slow steady financial success. Producers who enter the Kubrick world must know what they can and can not expect financially.

Kubrick was fascinated by the depraved. The US government hired him to film moon landing footage just in case we didn’t actually get any good footage of it. This experience introduced him to the secret heads of society. He saw depravity there. He was friends with pedo Arthur c. clarke — and chose to make Lolita based on his experiences with him. He felt like someone introduced to high society by committing a crime (the footage): this is reflected in the plot and themes of Barry Lyndon. Everything that Stephen King hated about Kubricks version of The Shining are the weird additions that make it Kubricks coded confession about the hell he put his family through working for those who run society. Eyes Wide Shut was his final exposé about those who control society and engage in weird sex magick shit.

Blips which come to mind whenever EWS pops up again on DL.

Kubrick wanted Cruise and Kidman because he wanted a big box-office hit which was also an art-house classic. (Good luck squaring that circle.) Doubtless the deep wide gossip about the pair didn't harm the film's buzz.

Notable given views of TC's unimpressive heterosexuality that detailed gossip about TC's wrestling evenings during the London shoot later emerged. Maybe (per DL's 'scrubbed' thread) now hard to find, maybe not.

Apparently in a phone conversation with his friend R Lee Ermey (of 'Full Metal Jacket' fame), Kubrick commented, 'The fact is, Cruise and Kidman ruined my movie.'

Whatever S Pollack's ulterior connections, Kubrick's first choice for the role was Harvey Keitel: who was sacked. (Later again read a lively rumour on DL that Keitel disgraced himself with Kidman, and Cruise said it's him or me.)

The creepy Rothschild party images above are reminiscent of the party ghosts from 'The Shining.'

Much good info about EWS comes in screenwriter F Raphael's book about working with Kubrick, 'Eyes Wide Open.' Kubrick's spontaneous excitement when FR talks about Epstein-style elite arrangements suggests he wasn't as clued-up as some on this thread suggest. When Kubrick asks Raphael where he got this stuff, the screenwriter says, 'I made it up.'

Years later I heard Raphael in a radio interview comment that Kubrick was dying while making EWS. The uber-control freak for every imaginable reason would of course seek to keep this information private. The heart attack after his near-final edit might not therefore be classed as 'convenient.'

While watching the movie, did none of you feel the urge to burst out laughing at the absurdity and pomposity of it all, especially in scenes like the one posted at R132?

Whoever is spouting moon landing and other wacko conspiracy bullshit- I hate you. You contribute nothing. We are all just a little bit dumber for having read what you have to say. You are mentally ill, and worse, endlessly uninteresting. I hope bad things happen to you. I wish there were a way to conspire to have you killed, or at least take away your internet forever.

At some point it was to have been Alec Baldwin and Kim Bassinger. Imagine?

R160 There were some cringe making moments that stand out but there are few perfect movies.

How can we see that American flag on the moon? Is it still there?

How was Armstrong filmed from the outside descending the steps? Did they have a selfie sticks back then?

Is it true the original tapes were taped over because they weren't deemed important? Nasa didn't deem them important? The most expensive footage of all time and they couldn't afford to buy a couple of new video cassettes?

NA$A $CAM

WAKE UP PEOPLE!!!!!

biggest flop of its year, even Kubrick said it was a piece of utter shit.

he blamed its lifelessness on ms kidman.

Tammy looks tres gay in OP photo!

When it came out I enjoyed it as big-star campy Euro-art-cinema fun, pretty, silly, and an homage to David Lynch. It's a bizarre twin to Barry Lyndon.

Eyes Rolled Shut

R119 Very interesting theory on JK Rowling. I personally never understood the appeal nor the success of Harry Potter.

[quote] Remember that 20th Century Fox was legally obligated to release the movie "Idiocracy", but they didn't want to because the movie joked about Starbucks selling hand jobs, and it depicted Costco and other big brands in a negative light.

So 20th Century Fox released the film at like 2-3 theaters, for one week or one weekend, just to meet it's bare minimum contract obligation to release the film.

I wonder, is this what happened to THE EAST too? Also released by 20th Century Fox, and only for one week around where I live.

Saw EWS when it was released. Remember being seriously disappointed. Visually it was good, and I'd fault more Kidman than Cruise on the boring side of it, but the sheer ludicrousness of the masked secret society had me laughing out loud. The only scene I liked was the one in the shop, the creepy father was great and LeeLee Sobieski should have been a star. Also enjoyed the bit with Alan Cumming.

The silver fox, Nightingale, the naval officer... All that was junk. Felt like I was watching The Young and the Restless or possibly another daytime soap.

That said, many years later (2-3 Xmas ago) I felt like rewatching it and enjoyed it a great deal more. The Swedish actress playing the widow gives a great performance. This I had entirely forgotten. The music is rather good (at least Chris Isaak is). And, yes, the film is about a secret society and not at all a fly-on-the-wall documentary about Kidman and Cruise's (a)sexual marriage. Of course the studio couldn't market it for what it was.

R95 Clearly, the MET Gala has nothing on the 1972 Rothschild dinner party.

I like the surreal dream like west 8th street set and the pretty young whore's run down dirty old apartment is so beautifully detailed it seems surreal as well.

(younger) Alec Baldwin would have made it sexy. He would have shown his ass again; pumping, thrusting hips ... mmm.

I agree that Alec Baldwin would have been a better choice, but not paired with Kim Basinger, who can't act. Baldwin/Kidman would have been interesting.

Because it was terrible.

Only movie I’ve ever walked out of. Fucking terrible.

Oh, R161, calm DOWN. Most of us know that a lot of the conspiracy stuff is utter reaching bullocks, but it has it's charm - it's presence is necessary and makes the film even more intriguing than it already is. All part of the fun...

I think the film is mesmerizing - extremely hypnotic. Thought this since the day I saw it in an old, beautifully and classically decorated opera-house-turned-movie-theater when it was released in '99. Bought the DVD and have been watching it periodically ever since - it makes me zone out EVERY time. Not even exaggerating when I called it "hypnotic"...

A deep, dark, alluring dream.

A scene that never gets mentioned - and I had forgotten, myself, until I watched it again, is when he’s summoned to the home of a wealthy old man who has died. The man’s neurotic daughter makes a clumsy pass at Dr. Bill and then the daughter’s fiancé arrives. It seems pointless, but there always has to be a reason. Was that scene to establish how horny rich people are? How crazy they are? How he’s a tool for all his rich patients?

[quote]It seems pointless, but there always has to be a reason.

The scene is a variation on the theme of sex and death. That time, in Cruise's professional context. Other sex/death conflations are the girl who OD'd at the grand party, the girl who died after the orgy, and the prostitute Cruise befriended who died of AIDS.

Also, earlier Kidman had mocked and teased Cruise for likely being turned on when examining women's breasts. So the idea of professional compromise (however remote in that instance) is shown again in the dead man's apartment.

The omnipresence of death is thus linked to the near impossibility of monogamy. We all think about sex all the time and want as much of it as possible because we're going to die. Good luck monogamy with those odds.

worst movie of its or any other year. unwatchable. even Kubrick hated it

Eyes Wide Shit.

What the hell happened to Alec Baldwin’s looks? He was a god.

Jennifer Jason Leigh filmed the role of the woman with the dying father who makes the pass at Cruise. Was later recast and the scene reshot. Would be interesting to see the footage with her and Keitel.

I'm a doctor!

The whole thing (especially the masked orgy sequence in the mansion) would have made far more sense had Kubrick retained the original setting from the source material of turn-of-the-century Vienna.

Where was it reported that Kubrick hated it? He didn't even get to complete the editing.

r20, I'm sure thats not a coincidence. The elites killed John John. And were making a statement at how powerful and disturbed they are with this film.

I hate pretty much all movies and liked this one so much I paid again to see it a second time which is rare for me. I had to see it because it was Kubrick the last genius of the cinema.

All this twaddle about "they sold their kid, she walked off with those two men" shows what a shit storyteller Kubrick was. If that was what he intended, he should have made it clear - that would have given the film much needed dramatic weight.

It was a pretentious mediocre movie.

Tom Cruise has a perfect movie star face.

Kubrick really didn't tell stories. Except for Spartacus which he disowned. If you want plot you don't go to the greatest filmmakers.

Looked so much like Salman Rushdie.

I and my friends demanded and got our $ bak after seeing this piece of shit.

he said cruise and kidman were total bitchers and crumb bum actors to work with, muchly regretted hiring them.

Is that English, R199?

R199 is channeling Nadsat-speak from 'A Clockwork Orange.'

Wouldn't it have been easier if they insisted that Dr. William (Tom's character) just sign a non disclosure agreement?

[quote]Kubrick's suspicious and perfectly convenient heart attack meant that not only did he lose control of the final cut of the movie, but he lost control over how the movie was marketed.

I sat behind 2 conspiracy theorists on a flight from LAX to Lima and they discussed this very thing the entire way. They also posited that Phillip Seymour Hoffman was given bad heroin because of The Master.

Casting was wrong from the start. Those two fronting swinging and kink?

I told Kurbrick to stick with Borgnine and Glenn, but he wouldn't listen and now she'll never get the Oscar.

[quote]Kubrick was literally telling us about Jeffrey Epstein

In 1999?

[quote]and the Frankist/Kabbalah cabal that runs the international banks and the Western media.

Oh there we go, it’s the Jews’ fault. Of course.

I suppose that poster the usual suspect?

I’ve watched this movie several times and always felt there was something missing. The great mansion scene hinted at deeper things but ultimately felt empty. The orgy victims being children makes everything click into place. Its narrative about secrecy, abuse, and privilege makes perfect sense that way. One could never make that movie obviously, but was there any subliminal messaging or symbolism suggesting that the women represented children, or were sex trafficked, or any of the other really horrible shit some wealthy people do? Using Manhattanite supermodel-type women does not have the same implications.

Sorry if the above sounds strange. This movie has been a puzzle for me for so long, and I could never figure out what Kubrick was really trying to say. Thinking about it in terms of what Epstein did really makes sense and tells a truth...but that’s not the film Kubrick made.

[quote]but not paired with Kim Basinger, who can't act.

She is a better actress than Kidman, and that’s saying something. I wonder if there was some point when Kubrick, cinematic genius, master manipulator, who went to any length to get what he wanted from his actors, had an “oh shit” moment and realized that nothing he could do would make Tom or Nic not suck on screen.